MATLAB and Simulink in the World: The MATLAB Enabled Campus

Universities worldwide provide faculty, researchers, and students with anytime, anywhere access to MATLAB® and Simulink®. With MATLAB available to everyone on campus, these schools are fostering interdisciplinary study and research, supporting problem-based learning, and giving students hands-on, industry-relevant experience.

Aalborg University

Using problem-based learning to turn students into active learners

Founded more than 20 years ago, the Problem-Based Learning (PBL) program at Aalborg University (AAU) in Denmark has become a model for universities around the world. From their first semester, AAU students use Model-Based Design to solve real-world problems in the energy, aerospace, and marine industries. Students have completed European Space Agency projects in which they used MATLAB and Simulink to model and simulate monitoring systems that detect faults during a spacecraft’s re-entry. They are currently using MATLAB and Simulink to model, simulate, and prototype control systems and condition-monitoring algorithms for the European AEOLUS wind farm project.

Politecnico di Torino

Inviting industry experts to teach students complex embedded system development

Companies in the region around Politecnico di Torino need automotive and avionics engineers capable of developing complex, high-integrity embedded software. To help meet this need, the university introduced Model-Based Software Design, a course for fifth-year students that combines lectures and practical exercises with seminars conducted by local engineers. Students learn embedded system design by building and simulating an executable model; rigorously validating, testing, and debugging it; and generating code for an embedded target.

McGill University

Electroencephalography (EEG) and magnetoencephalography (MEG) instruments capture electrical activity from the entire volume of the brain at a rate of 1000 times per second, yielding roughly 100 MB of data per minute. Researchers at the McConnell Brain Imaging Center at McGill University, with colleagues at Case Western Reserve University and the University of Southern California, developed Brainstorm, an open-source, MATLAB based software application that neuroscience researchers with no programming experience can use to visualize and process large volumes of EEG/ MEG data. Researchers can interact directly with their data, contribute new plug-ins, and exchange ideas and code prototypes with other Brainstorm users.

Cornell University

Bioacoustics scientists study animal populations by analyzing animal sounds recorded in oceans, jungles, forests, and other natural environments. Bioacoustics Research Program scientists at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology have developed a MATLAB based platform for analyzing terabytes of data generated by passive acoustic monitoring systems. The team saved years of development time, cut analysis time from weeks to hours, and developed algorithms that enable researchers to assess the effect of man-made noise on natural environments and monitor endangered animal populations.

University of Melbourne

Adopting a multidisciplinary curriculum to improve student outcomes

To prepare engineering students for careers spanning a wide range of disciplines, the Melbourne School of Engineering at the University of Melbourne adopted an educational model in which students complete a broad-based curriculum to earn an undergraduate degree in three years and a specialized Master of Engineering degree two years later. Students use MATLAB and Simulink to learn and apply concepts in basic linear algebra, control systems, signal processing, and mechatronics. Professors have coupled MATLAB with hands-on activities, enabling students to explore new concepts with immediate, visual feedback as they progress from theory to numerical computation and lab experiments.

Hanyang University

Shortening ECU development times while delivering practical skills to future engineers

Like their competitors worldwide, Korean automotive manufacturers are facing increased development costs due to growing technological complexity, stricter fuel economy and safety regulations, and more diverse customer needs. The Automotive Control and Electronics Laboratory (ACE Lab), a research institute affiliated with Hanyang University in South Korea, shortened development times and lowered costs by replacing their traditional control development process with Model-Based Design. As part of its collaboration with ACE Lab, Hanyang University incorporated MATLAB and Simulink into class assignments and exercises at the graduate and undergraduate levels to help students acquire the skills and practical experience needed by Korea’s future automotive engineers.